“Who are you calling an old drunk?” Mick snarled, bumping his chest against the younger man’s.
“Pipe down,” Donahue ordered, easily brushing Mick aside. “We’ve got a lot to discuss, and it’s time for the lawyer to leave.”
Ruby grabbed Patrick by the arm. “Your ma will be waitin’ dinner for you, love,” she said, funneling him toward the door.
“Hey, Patrick,” Mick called out, “tell them no deal, okay? I’ve got too many irons in the fire to settle for the Blackstones’ scrawny deal.”
Patrick had the answer he expected and nodded to Ruby before leaving the boardinghouse, but something was wrong here. Despite the ribbing he took from folks in the neighborhood, he was no wide-eyed innocent. His job brought him into a world of prostitutes, pickpockets, and grifters. He was even willing to represent Mick Malone, possibly the shadiest man in the Five Points, because Father Doyle asked it of him.
Patrick was honor-bound by his profession to work in the best interests of his client, but that same code of ethics meant he couldn’t overlook a crime in progress, and Patrick sensed something shady. What motivated those men to come all the way from West Virginia and partner with Mick Malone against the Blackstones?
Patrick had no proof of wrongdoing, but he couldn’t look the other way. The ethical obligations of a lawyer often collided with the integrity of an upright man, and sometimes it was hard to know what to do.
In this case, Patrick would rely on the one man who had never steered him wrong, and that meant a visit to Father Doyle the following morning.
Saint Boniface College was in the heart of Brooklyn, surrounded by factories, ironworks, and tenements. Elevated trains rumbled overhead, and a dozen different languages could be heard on any given street corner. There were no walls around the college, so Patrick had a good view of the German delicatessen across the street as the owner lugged a side of beef into the shop.
Father Doyle sat on the bench beside him as Patrick recounted the previous day’s events at Mick’s place. Dressed in all black except for his clerical collar, Father Doyle still looked exactly as he did sixteen years earlier when Patrick first spotted him heading toward a trolley stop in the Five Points. He had chased the old man down to ask what it took to become a priest. It was the moment that changed Patrick’s life forever. Father Doyle had glanced at his black eye, split lip, scabbed-over knuckles, and drawn the right conclusion about how Patrick earned a living. There probably weren’t a lot of boxers who aspired to the priesthood, but Father Doyle was generous with his time that afternoon and provided Patrick with a path to a new and better life. During those early years, Patrick believed the best way to prove his devotion to God was to aim for the highest rank, and that meant the priesthood. It was the purest form of commitment and came with lifelong responsibilities and sacrifices he was eager to assume. His vows would be joyfully offered and forever carved in stone.
It hadn’t worked out that way, and he still carried the shame of bailing out on Father Doyle. The upside was that he could help the old priest by counseling people in the streets instead of in the pews. That meant venturing into the seedier side of life, and he still came to Father Doyle for advice.
“All I have is a hunch,” he told the priest. “Mick claims he’s only writing a book to earn a little money, but I think it’s part of a bigger scheme. Those men from Mingo County didn’t come all this way to help Mick sell his book.”
“And what makes you think they’re up to no good?” the priest asked. “Because of the way they look? Because the people of Mingo County have no love for the Blackstones?”
“I think they’re here to stir up trouble,” Patrick said. “I agreed to represent Mick for that book, but I didn’t sign up for anything else, and I don’t like being dragged into it.”
Patrick had already read the memoir to be sure it contained nothing that libeled the Blackstones. The memoir seethed with resentment, but if all it did was assert Mick’s opinions, the Blackstones had no legal cause to block its publication.
“The memoir is foul,” he said. “Most of it is bellyaching about the indignities he’s endured at the hands of the Blackstones. Not that the Blackstones are angels, mind you. There’s something deeply tricky about that family. They sent a woman to bribe me into scuttling the book.”
“What woman?” Father Doyle asked.
Memory of his irrational attraction to the Blackstone woman still plagued Patrick, and he sent a cautious glance toward the old priest. “Gwen Kellerman. She claimed to know you. Does she?”
“I’m well acquainted with Mrs. Kellerman,” Father Doyle said in a warmly approving tone. “She is the sort of quiet, gentle light that makes the world a better place.”
It wasn’t what Patrick wanted to hear. It would be easier to dismiss his attraction if she’d been stamped in the same ruthless mold as the rest of her family. He shrugged off Mrs. Kellerman and shifted the conversation back to Malone.
“I know Malone kidnapped that child,” he said. “If he was willing to confess and repent, I’d gladly help him make a clean breast of it. But no, he wants money so he can move to Brooklyn. He’s slime, Father. Next time you kick a case my way, try to find someone who isn’t up to his eyeballs in corruption.”
“Already done,” Father Doyle said agreeably. “The holy sisters who run the primary school are having trouble paying their water bill, and the city is threatening to cut them off. I was hoping you might volunteer your legal services.”
Patrick nodded. “Whatever you need. You know that.”
Father Doyle had funded Patrick’s education, but the church rarely wanted men fresh out of school to assume the responsibilities of the priesthood. After college, Patrick began practicing law and got plenty of experience in the real world, then returned to the seminary once he was ready to proceed into the priesthood. He continued practicing law while studying theology, but two weeks before taking his final vows, he balked.
His gaze strayed to the delicatessen across the street. The owner had a young and shapely daughter named Bettina, and Patrick’s willpower stumbled one autumn afternoon when he spent a forbidden few hours with her behind an abandoned rail station. He wasn’t cut out to be a priest; he wanted a wife. He wanted a partner and a mother for his children. He wanted a big, rollicking family along with a woman he could kiss and hold until dawn. Trying to deny that longing was like asking his heart to stop beating.
He didn’t want a quick, shameful tryst behind a rail station. He wanted the blessing of God and his community when he stepped out with a woman by his side. Patrick had been shaking in mortification when he confessed his forbidden encounter with Bettina to Father Doyle, but his mentor didn’t seem surprised.
“The priesthood is a calling,” he had said. “We can’t have reluctant warriors in our ranks, but there are plenty of other ways you can serve God in the world.”
Thousands of people never set foot in a church and instinctively recoiled from priests wearing that intimidating clerical collar, but they might listen to a former boxer with scars on his body and an accent like theirs. Patrick lived among the ordinary people—rich or poor, clean or struggling in the muck—and tried to teach by example.